I first supported the death penalty until I found out how many innocent individuals were being killed and how costly it was on the taxpayers. In a free and just society, we should always strive to protect life, most especially all innocent life. And, ultimately, it costs the taxpayers more to put a man to death than keeping him locked up for life. So after studying the issue, I now strongly oppose the death penalty.
Jeff Frazee
Founder and Chairman, Young Americans for Liberty
Are some crimes so heinous as to be worthy of the ultimate earthly punishment? Yes. Are some who commit those crimes capable of remorse, redemption and restitution? Yes, but not if they’re dead. Is government guilty of sloppiness and error in its judgments? Oh my God, yes! Add to that the proven fact that capital punishment in our clunky court system costs more than life without parole and you arrive at an inescapable conclusion: the right alternatives to capital punishment offer more hope, more deterrence and more justice.
Lawrence W. Reed
President Emeritus, Foundation for Economic Education
Government has no business in the taking of life that is not strictly related to national defense. The same people who don’t believe that government can efficiently deliver health services or regulate the economy believe it can execute people without a mistake. Government should have no authority to make decisions where a mistake could mean the taking of an innocent life. I would rather see 100 guilty men go free, than to see one innocent person executed.
Austin Petersen
Founder and Editor of The Libertarian Republic
On the core issue — yes or no on capital punishment — I’m with the opponents. Better to err on the side of not taking life. The teaching of the Catholic Church, to which I belong, seems right to me: The state has the legitimate authority to execute criminals, but it should refrain if it has other means of protecting people from them. Our government almost always does.
Ramesh Ponnuru
Senior Editor for National Review and Visiting Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute
Conservatives have every reason to believe the death penalty system is no different from any politicized, costly, inefficient, bureaucratic, government-run operation, which we conservatives know are rife with injustice. But here the end result is the end of someone’s life. In other words, it’s a government system that kills people.
Richard Viguerie
Advisor to President Ronald Reagan
The death penalty runs a dangerously high risk of killing innocent people, siphons billions of dollars from the public, and gives the government power it cannot be trusted to carry out fairly.
Jeffrey Tucker
Founder, Author, and President at Brownstone Institute
The government’s culture of death–including capital punishment–must be opposed by everyone who loves freedom and life.
Lew Rockwell
Founder and Chairman, Ludwig Von Mises Institute
The death penalty is too perilous to risk to human error.
Bruce Fein
Associate Deputy Attorney General and General Counsel to the Federal Communications Commission under President Ronald Reagan
I used to support the death penalty, but I oppose it now. It gives the state too much power, it actually cost more money than life in prison without parole, and the government sometimes sentences innocent people to death.
Julie Borowski
Political commentator and author
I believe that support for the death penalty is inconsistent with libertarianism and traditional conservatism. So I am pleased with Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty’s efforts to form a coalition of libertarians and conservatives to work to end capital punishment.
Dr. Ron Paul
Former Congressman and GOP Presidential candidate
